


Watch Out, You Might Get What You're After

by polyphaga



Category: Metal Gear
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Canon Bisexual Character, Dubious Consent, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Processing, Vomiting, gay pinball, hair petting, it's pw era medic/kaz why isn't there a tag for that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-06
Updated: 2016-12-12
Packaged: 2018-05-25 02:45:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6177100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/polyphaga/pseuds/polyphaga
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of PW-era Medic/Kaz scenes I'll add to as inspiration strikes. Warning for Kaz being a dumbass and a lot of emotional/sexuality-related processing. I'm using Kawaiibooker's Medic headcanon so this is for her :></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kawaiibooker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kawaiibooker/gifts).



MSF never implemented a formal non-fraternization policy, and while Kaz had taken advantage of his boss’ administrative oversight on many occasions, he was beginning to think it was, just maybe, not ideal. It wasn’t just that Big Boss recently seemed to get a kick out of turning Kaz’s opportunism back on him, with oddly possessive touches that would have crossed the line in a more… ‘regulated’ environment, taunting him with smirked ultimatums, “your focus can either be on chasing women or working with me,” all of which made his stomach drop and heart inexplicably race. No, that was his own problem. 

In terms of base admin, there were few men who stood even a remote chance of catching the interest of a woman independent and strong-headed enough to hold her own in a PMC. The few successful relationships around base, Swan and Armadillo, for example, were enough to make the other men antsy, to the point that they’d beg to go into the nearest city for their free evening on the weekends, see some “normal” women, get away from what they saw as unnatural aberrations of femininity who wouldn’t give most of them the time of day. Whatever. Usually they only ever found out that no matter where you go, women still miraculously have standards.

Kaz rolled his eyes, unable to bear watching some new recruit tripping over himself to pester a woman who’d only entered the bar 5 minutes ago, hadn’t even gotten her drink order yet. He usually ended up chaperoning these outings because Big Boss took no interest and would shoot the idea down outright. Of course, the man had charisma to spare and could make unpopular decisions without a thought, but Kaz always felt like he had to work a bit harder to earn the staff’s admiration. So he ended up being the one everyone knew was a good sport about these things. Now, bored out of his mind in the awkward atmosphere that had taken over the bar, leaning on a disused pool table and sipping at a weak mojito, he was wondering if this desperate bid for popularity was even remotely worth it. 

Most of the men gave up on these excursions after two or three tries but there were always new recruits to fill the abandoned seats these days. MSF had grown significantly in the two years since Kaz joined, and while it was gratifying to be a big part of its success on paper, he missed the intimacy of when it was just ten or twelve of them in a leaky shed, where every meal and every mission was a full communal effort. A few members from back then were still around, soldiers Kaz would consider the closest thing he still had to family, true comrades only second to his boss. One of them, oddly enough, always tagged along on these trips even though he seemed uninterested in the stated goal of chatting up women in hopes of winning a quick lay.

Kaz made his way over to where the man was, in an ill-lit corner, fingers nimbly manipulating the flippers of the single, beat up pinball machine in the bar. Placing his drink on top of the backbox, he waited for the other man’s eyes, buried under thick brows, creased in concentration, to flash up from the game that was in play and meet his own. 

“Vincente.”

“Been awhile since I heard that name, commander.” He doesn’t look up again, but smirks, lobbing one of the pinballs perfectly into a habitrail. 

Kaz found himself chuckling at the teased formality. “Oh, come on! You’re way too straight laced… Medic.” The other man just smirked and nodded, watching his game closely. 

The first medically trained staff member recruited to MSF, simply nicknamed Medic, usually seemed content to spend his free evening nursing cocktails and quietly aiming for the top of the neglected pinball machine’s leaderboard. While it was true that Kaz was happy to have him along regardless, since his skills had come in handy after more than a few barfights and drunken accidents, he still wondered what the draw was. 

“So, you’re pretty good at this, huh?” Kaz grabbed his drink and moved around the table, watching over the man’s shoulder instead. 

“I’m just an amateur.” Medic punctuated the statement with a quick yank on the plunger, launching a ball directly into the skillshot, activating a cheery jingle.

“That’s a lie.” Again, Medic only smiled at this, his focus hardly wavering from the game. Kaz hung back to watch for a while, sipping at his drink as he watched the percussive movements of his fingers on the flipper buttons, the way his hips, flush against the front of the machine would occasionally nudge forward but never hit the tilt sensor. Even though the machine’s lights were dim and half the bells only registered with a half-hearted clink, it was strangely absorbing to watch.

“You know,” Kaz continued, after finishing his drink and licking a last bit of lime juice from the corner of his mouth. “We had something like this when I was a kid in Japan. Pachinko. But it was just a bunch of noise and lights to me then, too. I don’t get it.”

“It’s hard to follow at first, but you eventually get a strategy--” Medic inhaled sharply as the ball in play flew clean between the two lower flippers and the machine went dark, the six-figure score on the board just painfully short of making it into the top 3. “It takes a while, but if you’re patient and pay attention you can figure it out.” He picked his drink up from where it was sitting in a ring of condensation on the corner of the glass, and emptied it as well. 

“So you don’t come out here to… uh…” Kaz lowered his glasses and gave a telling glance at the other men. “Socialize?”

“I’m not that kind of guy.”

Kaz thought back fondly to early memories of the group, and it was true. While most of the other men got drunk in the evenings, bonding over crass jokes and stories of their sexual escapades, Kaz would occasionally notice Medic off to the side, usually reading or just stargazing. Sometimes if it had been a long day, or something left him in a bad mood, he’d join him. 

“Fair enough.” 

“You wanna take it for a spin?”

“Hm?” Kaz found himself stammering a bit, wondering why his instinctual reaction was to feign ignorance at what he was talking about. “Oh. Well, I guess I’d be willing to embarrass myself if you buy me another drink.”

“That’s the spirit.” Medic took Kaz’s empty glass and headed back towards the bar while Kaz tried to decode the worn text describing point values and bonuses on the machine.

“Ready?” The other man was back a few moments later, and placed a fresh mojito on the corner of the table, holding his own drink. He stood at Kaz’s side, keeping a good view of the table over his shoulder, and reached down towards his hip to slide in a quarter. “Alright, just go for it.”

“How far should I--”

“Don’t worry about it, getting a feel for it is a part of learning.”

Kaz snorted a bit at that, taking a swig of his drink. “Really? Sounds like a good way for them to squeeze a few more quarters out of you.”

“I know it’s hard for you to turn it off, _commander_ , but stinginess isn’t really the right mindset to approach pinball games with,” Medic teased, with a slight bite of sarcasm.

“Fine.”

He launched into the first game, letting the first two balls drop to the gutter without much flourish. However, with the third, he began to get the hang of things, gradually drawing more lights and sounds from the machine. He didn’t realize he was distracted by a flashing bonus indicator, until he felt an arm quickly wrap around his own, body warmth suddenly snug against his back, pushing his own fingers into the left flipper button for a narrow save. Medic smartly lobbed the last ball into a kickout hole, giving Kaz a split second to exhale a quick “thanks.”

A warm chuckle, unusually close to his ear. “No problem.”

Despite that miraculous save, the third ball soon joined the others in the drain, and the machine went dark.

“One more?” Kaz asked.

“These are my quarters, you know.”

“Next drink’s on me then.”

“Fine, twist my arm.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Forewarning on some dubious consent issues and mild homophobia this chapter. Also the rating has gone up.

The spirit of not holding back in practice sessions seems useful in concept, but Big Boss never knew when this principle could be pushed into impracticality. If half the men you demonstrate on end up going to the infirmary before the end of the session, the waste in cost and medical labor alone… Kaz bitterly found himself tallying up the figures in his head as he waited for his boss to show up to their usual Tuesday afternoon one-on-one training sessions that he both anticipated and dreaded, trying to get his mind off the cold, tense feeling in his chest. Sometimes it felt like the only way Boss could truly communicate was through hard contact, skin to bruising skin, and these sessions were usually exhausting, painful, but one compliment, one look of surprise that let Kaz know deep down the man was taken off guard by his improvement, that could make it all worth it.

Not today. When Big Boss did finally decide to show up, they immediately got down to business without a word, and Kaz found himself tripped, grappled, tossed to the ground, with his struggles hardly eliciting more than a grunt from the older man. The helplessness of feeling the sharp pressure of a knee on your spine, your arm twisted behind your back and almost pulling out of your shoulder socket, sometimes it started to feel too real for a practice drill. Kaz could feel his heart pounding, his breath going panicky and shallow, even though they’d only been at it for five minutes. Still, he willed himself to spring back up, unsteady on his feet, and get ready for the next round. This time, his perseverance was rewarded with a quick strike to the solarplexus, leaving him winded and knocked on his ass. Not one to back off before finishing the job, Big Boss was on him like an animal, grabbing one of his legs and pulling it into a painful submission lock. 

It felt like his knee could be snapped off sideways with the amount of pressure usually needed to break a toothpick. Kaz could sense, against his will, tears welling up in the corners of his eyes. More humiliating than that though, was the full body flush he felt from the other man’s body being so snug against his own. Snake eased the pressure on his knee up slightly, but still ensured it was held in a position his XO couldn’t wriggle free from. He gazed slowly, almost boredly across the prone, sweating body under him and then paused, glancing down at Kaz’s crotch. 

“Typical. This is always the problem, isn’t it?”

“God… Sh… Shut up…” Kaz closed his eyes and let his head loll to the side, knowing that the slight bulge in his pants was blatantly obvious from Big Boss’ position. “Why are you being so rough today anyways? I hardly have the time or the energy to keep up with the paperwork and drills you expect me to do, much less act as your personal punching bag… or get laid for that matter.” Snake ignored his attempt to dodge the subject. 

“Kaz, you’ve got to get this under control. It’s a weakness.” His words were firm, blunt, but didn’t come out with his usual commanding tone. Almost timidly, Kaz let out a slight huff at the thought, one of his boss’ hands dropped from the leg lock and reached down to palm Kaz’s half-erection through his pants. He inhaled sharply, so surprised at the contact, unable to stop his eyelids from fluttering and his breath coming out in a gentle moan. Kaz looked up, almost afraid of what sort of expression Boss would be making, but only caught the corners of his lips twitching up for a moment before he went back to palming him with a straight face. It was the first time Kaz had seen him express a hint of sexual interest in, well, anything. He let his head fall back again, feeling his body heat building where his superior was agonizingly teasing him while he could only go limp against the ground to ease the pressure on his leg. 

Snake stroked the base of Kaz’s dick with his fingers, and then traced the whole outline as Kaz grew to full arousal before starting to jack him off through the fabric in earnest. It took an embarrassingly short amount of time before Kaz began to feel himself edging towards making a mess of himself, heaping more humiliation onto the already monstrous pile. As he began to squirm, pressing his hips into Snake’s hand and moaning openly, the man above him grinned and let his locked knee drop to the ground so he wouldn’t tear his joint in half from a particularly powerful orgasm. Kaz realized could easily get away at that point. Big Boss was letting him go. Nothing was stopping him. He didn’t go anywhere. 

“Oh god, Boss… please…” The words started falling from his mouth without conscious will. Kaz threw his forearm over his face in mortification but Snake just as quickly pushed it aside, roughly grabbing his neck, forcing Kaz to meet the eye studying him with a sort of detached but pleased interest before he threw his head back in a full body shudder, coming in his pants. 

Snake only allowed for a single beat of silence before pulling himself back to his feet almost as quickly as he had knocked Kaz down. Kaz was still sprawled on the ground, panting shallowly, brain full of static until he heard his name, the stern tone of Big Boss having returned.

“Kaz. We’re done here. Clean yourself up and go.”

“Snake... I mean, Boss, I’m--” 

“Just get it under control, Kaz.”

  
  


Four days after that sparring practice gone awry, Kaz found himself participating in the usual drink and gossip along the beach, typical to Friday evenings in MSF. He felt drained, like had used the majority of his emotional energy, usually reserved for collegiality with the men and flirting with the women, instead for willing himself not to think about what had happened. And, maybe that was Snake’s plan all along, shake him up enough to force him into this weird, self-imposed chastity. So far, it had worked excellently. 

God damn it, there he was, thinking about it again. Kaz became aware of the bitter, strained expression on his face as well as the fact that he hadn’t contributed a word to the usual lively conversations among the relaxing MSF members, as they took advantage of the later drill starting hours on Saturdays and Sundays to pass a dwindling bottle of liquor between themselves. He had been heavily indulging in swigs from the bottle, however, and it again came around to his position in the circle. Holding up his hand to say no thanks, he got up from the group without a word, trying not to look so sour-faced, and took a few paces away from the firepit they’d set up on the beach, to where it was dimmer, cooler, less crowded. He pulled a sizeable personal flask from one of his own pockets, unscrewing it as quietly as possible. 

“Hey, Commander.” The voice came from unexpectedly close. Before his mind could catch up to recognize it, Kaz jolted, sloshing some of the rum inside of the flask all over his hand. The medic laughed gently, laid on his side in the still warm sand, reading a book by a small lantern. “Sorry, I was just going to tell you to watch your feet.” Taking longer than usual to recover from the surprise, Kaz let out a shaky sigh, sucking some of the spilt liquor off his fingers as he took a seat next to the other man. 

“Sorry, my mind was somewhere else.”

“Really? It wasn’t from keeping your sunglasses on this late?”

“Very funny.” Still, Kaz slid his aviators off, carefully folding them and placing them in the sand next to the lantern. He took a giant swig from the flask before offering it to the medic, who took a respectfully moderate sip, before lying on his back, watching the stars come out. After a few moments he heard the soft sound of a book closing, a lantern clicking off, a body shifting around only a foot away from him.

“You seem troubled.”

“Isn’t that my job around here? Professional manager of every trouble imaginable.” Kaz scoffed.

“Just not in a party mood, then? Usually it seems to take your mind off things.”

“I don’t want to be around the men right now.” He looked over and sensed the outline of a slight smirk on the medic’s face. “You’re different.”

“I know.”

Kaz knew a fair bit about the Medic’s background, that he was around 10 or 12 years Kaz’s senior, grew up in South America and so was one of their more local recruits, and had turned to battlefield medicine when the lucrative medical jobs in the city outpaced his training. Best to become a real pro at the basics, that way you can always pull through in a pinch he said, instead of relying on having the best technology or equipment. That change in career had taken him all over the continent, helping wherever he was needed through the 60s, now MSF had recently become his most permanent post. He’d been on the battlefield for a while, probably before Kaz had even considered it was a path his life could take. 

Kaz propped himself up on his elbow, taking another drink from the flask to steel himself, to wipe the last bit of hesitancy from his mind that this conversation might be a very bad idea. When he didn’t immediately lie back down, he noticed the medic turning to look at him with some interest.

“So… uh… You’ve been at it for a while, yeah? Military guy?”

“Mm. Boss got me beat there, though.” Kaz stammered, trying to respond normally to hearing  _ his _ title, but ended up coughing, choking on some spit. Medic sat up and gave him a firm clap on the back. “Hey, you alright?”

“Yeah-- It’s just--  he…” Kaz choked out a few fragments before willing himself to catch his breath and clear his throat, trying to order his thoughts before going on but it seemed like his mind was increasingly getting away from him. “I mean… You and him have been around it for so long so… You um… must have had a guy come on to you sometime, right? I mean there’s so many  _ jokes _ about it, there has to be some shred of truth.” Kaz felt his heart rate key up as he was met only with silence from a man who usually could offer decent advice about anything.

“Yeah, I mean… It’s normal.” Came the eventual, clipped response.

“Right, so it wasn’t even like, a sex thing.”

“Did something happen?”

Kaz rubbed both hands over his face, trying to center himself, work out the best, least catastrophic way to say something that might lead to some form of advice on what happened. 

“Well, I mean, it was kind of to teach me a lesson. He doesn’t like how much I… you know, go after women.”

“So you’re talking about Boss.”

Kaz blanched at the way he said it, like it was obvious and unsurprising, and knocked back another swig of booze in the awkward pause before accepting that if he wanted to talk about this with someone, it was probably inevitable that that detail would come out. 

“Do not tell anyone. Anyone. Not even some random chick in town, ok?”

“Of course, wouldn’t dream of it.” Kaz felt a warm hand brush his as the medic reached over slightly clumsily to grab the flask from his hand. Taking a few more gulps, he handed it back to Kaz.

“Thanks. I just… I don’t know. I was kind of okay with it, I guess? At first I panicked but… I dunno, these kind of things happen between men, right? And he’s so charismatic so you just let him do anything to you. I mean, it’s not like I wanna get married to the guy, I’m not  _ like that _ .”

“Like that?” Kaz shifted uncomfortably at the question, noticing his friend’s voice had gone low, the tone indecipherable.

“You know, I’m not in love with the guy. I’m not…” He paused before dredging up a word he wasn’t even sure he’d said in English before. “...a homosexual or anything.” A long lull in the conversation followed, and by now it had gotten so dark that the man next to him was mostly in shadow, unreadable. “Hey Medic?”

“What? Oh. Yeah, of course. Sorry.”

“Mm.” Kaz sloshed the flask, feeling that there was about one more drink left in it. He offered it to Medic, brushing his shoulder with his outstretched arm.

“No thanks, I’m good.”

“You sure?” Kaz pulled the flask back to his lips and drained it. “Thanks anyways. I just needed to get a second opinion on stuff, and you seem like you’d be a lot more mature about it than those guys.”

“Wow, high praise,” Medic responded sarcastically. They both laughed softly, the resulting silence between them amicable again. After watching the waves and the stars for another few minutes Kaz pulled himself up, and offered his hand to the other man. Kaz had always been terrible at holding his booze, though, and the shift in momentum from helping to pull his friend up sent him teetering backwards. Luckily, a firm arm reached around the small of his back, steadying him. He jumped at the contact, trying to straighten himself up as quickly as possible, but the medic kept his arm around his waist, noticing he was still gently swaying. 

“God, sorry. I’m drunk.”

“It’s fine. Listen,” The medic looked off to the side for a moment, taking a deep breath. “Even if you’re not, like you said… If anything happens to make you uncomfortable you should talk to someone, alright. I know it’s not my business, but I’d be happy if it was me.” He turned back to face Kaz, just close enough to tell that they met eyes in the light of the dying bonfire a few yards away.

“Yeah… of course. I trust you.”

“Good.” Medic took another moment to study Kaz’s face before looking back to where they had just been sitting. “Oh, let me get your sunglasses for you.” He gathered up the objects littered on the ground before carefully setting the shades back in their owner’s hands.

“Goodnight, commander.”

  
“Yeah, see you tomorrow morning.” 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note for more dubious consent related stuff and also some vomit/medical stuff for anyone who's squeamish about that. I'm sorry for everything.

It was best not to hope for anything too crazy. Usually, it just meant getting hurt. Maybe Medic had inherited his superstitious nature from his mother’s side of the family. His grandmother and mother were both fervent believers, in religion, in folk wisdom, in the paranormal, he grew up in an environment where all of these things requiring a suspension of disbelief were treated as a matter of fact. It left him with the feeling that wanting something too hard, wondering about it, daydreaming about it, could curse that very thing from ever happening to you. So he forced his mind off of the conversation he’d had with Kaz for the rest of the week.

_Hope would just end up making you look like a fool. As if people like you were supposed to have happy endings to hope for, anyways._

Medic winced, laying back on his bunk. It was a quiet Thursday evening with little traffic in the sickbay during the day. That meant closing up shop went quickly, getting to retire to his room before anyone else. But--

_That was the plan, wasn’t it? Throw yourself into hard, scary, demanding work so you wouldn’t have time to think about what life would be like, with a partner, with a family… Of course you couldn’t be a normal family doctor. The empty moments would eat you alive._

He wished there was something else to occupy him besides a borrowed paperback or trying to track down whatever small social gathering was forming for the evening. Kaz had become scarce at those anyways. Concerned rumors flew about how he was increasingly cooped up in the room he and Big Boss shared since shortly Boss had dragged him back to camp from his escape attempt, and the way other soldiers tiptoed around the clearly uncomfortable implications of this made Medic’s stomach sink. At one point he considered, maybe if he’d tell anyone at MSF, Kaz would be the first. Now it seemed like talking to him would be the most difficult.

Medic sighed, letting his eyes flutter shut. It wasn’t late enough to go to bed for the evening, but a nap couldn’t hurt, right? Years of med school meant he slept like the dead when he let his body go, and it would at least fill a few more of the empty hours.  


 

He woke, not sure what time it was, to a commotion in the room. He pulled down the sheets he had rolled himself up into and sat up slowly, eyes adjusting to the brightness of all the electric lights in the room switched on.

“Vincente, that you?” He recognized Hawk’s voice, one of his bunk mates, and turned towards the sound, rubbing his eyes and nodding blearily. As the world came into focus he noticed the usually confident and broad-shouldered man looked quite nervous. Hawk glanced at the doorway and called out “I found him!” before turning back to Medic.

“Sorry man, but Boss was looking for you. Miller’s in bad shape. You should--”

“What?”

“He brought him over to the sickbay and told us to find you--”

“How bad is it?” Medic disentangled himself from the sheets and blankets on his bed, leaving them in a heap at the foot. He was glad he still had his usual clothes on, and only had to slide into his boots.

“I.. I don’t know, he was carrying him and-- It’s pointless to explain, just go, ok?”

“Yeah, yeah” Medic grumbled, trying to cover with annoyance the fact that his heart pounding in his chest.  
  


When he arrived at the sickbay Big Boss had already haphazardly thrown Kaz onto one of the cots, one of his legs hanging limply over the side. Big Boss was standing in the corner, notably only wearing a pair of drab sweatpants, the angry scars across his arms and chest clearly visible. His face was locked in the usual expression it held in moments of distress, which read to more normal people as mild annoyance.

“What took you so long?”

Medic took a deep breath, in part because he had just ran over but just as much to swallow back a sarcastic retort.

“I thought I was done for the evening. Sorry.”

Big Boss only grumbled in response, nodding at the man unconscious on the cot. Kaz’s hair was messy, damp with sweat, and his sunglasses were nowhere to be found. Medic pulled open his eyes first, glassy and unfocused, before examining the rest of him. He looked pale, his breathing was weak and shallow, and when Medic pressed his hand to first his forehead and then his also conspicuously bare chest, his nerves spiked as he found him almost cold to the touch, with a weak pulse.

“What were you doing before he was unresponsive?” Medic forced himself to take on as flat a tone as possible. Even though he wasn’t turned to face him he could imagine Big Boss grunting and shifting uncomfortably before leaning on the wall behind him.

“Just having a few drinks.”

“Both of you reek of booze, this was more than a few.” Medic quickly paced over to the sink to wash his hands and put on gloves to prepare an IV drip. “He’s obviously got alcohol poisoning. Pretty bad, too.”

Big Boss shrugged. “He was going kind of fast, I guess. Just figured that’s how young guys are.”

“Anything else, besides the drinking?” This time, Medic couldn’t keep the edge of suspicion out of his voice. The silence from Big Boss in response was crushing, he could almost feel it bearing down on his back. That tone was insubordination after all. But his anger didn’t have time to gather.

A strangled gagging sound came from the bed, and Medic rushed over, calmly entering the zone where he was treating a patient, not a friend, and turned Kaz onto his side, clearing the small pool of bile and vomit collected in his mouth with gloved fingers, then instinctively reaching for a towel on the cart next to the bed, dabbing up the mess without even glancing away from Kaz’s face. Kaz’s eyes came halfway open for a moment, forehead furrowed in a pained expression that softened when Medic gently smoothed his hair back and out of his face, before drooping shut again. Medic sighed, sliding a pillow under Kaz to keep his head elevated before snapping off the soiled pair of gloves, returning to preparing the IV.

Whatever Big Boss’ response would have been, seeing that shook it out of him.

“Just get him cleaned up, alright.” He left without hesitation, probably realizing he wasn’t about to get a “yes, sir” out of the medic.

  


Kaz woke up a few hours later, feeling numb and heavy, except for a sharp pain between his eyes that seemed to swallow everything. The early dawn light seeping into the sickbay through the window made his eyes sting, but when he lifted an arm to try and shield himself from the light, he felt a painful tug in his wrist. At a loss for what to do, he just let out a groan.

“Commander, you’re up at last.” He recognized Medic’s calm, even voice, but it felt like it had been a long time since he’d heard it.

“Yeah,” he rasped, staying on his side, too weak to pull himself up. “Guess I really overdid it this time, huh?”

“Stay still.” Kaz heard the faucet turn on and off before Medic settled into the chair next to the bed and placed a glass of water with a plastic bendy straw onto the cart beside it. Kaz sighed with relief as his frame blotted out a direct view of the sunrise coming in through the window. “Ok, think you can sit up? I’ll help.”

“N-No… I still feel kind of dizzy, I want to stay lying down.” Kaz flushed at the request, betraying how helpless he really was feeling. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine. Scoot towards me a bit.”

As Kaz leaned in, Medic cradled a hand behind his neck, lifting his head so that he could take a few sips from the glass of water. Kaz took a drink, cleared his throat, and then laid back into the pillow.

“Feel better?”

“A little.”

“So, what happened?”

Kaz scrunched his eyes shut at Medic’s knowing tone. “I can only imagine how it looked when I got here. You probably can already tell.”

“Why did you drink so much? While I think your judgement when you're drunk is a bit questionable you've never gone that far.”

Kaz chuckled bitterly before choking out a raspy cough. “Sometimes it’s easier if you just feel like something’s happening _to_ you, rather than--” He was cut off by another series of coughs. “Uh, doc... More water?”

Medic tried to conceal his pained expression as Kaz glanced up at him.

“Oh… sure.” He cradled an arm around his head again, this time subconsciously stroking Kaz’s hair with his thumb as he watched him sip at the water again. Kaz stopped drinking, but held his head up on his own for a moment, apparently enjoying the feeling. “It's fine, but... You know, when I told you I wanted you to talk to me, I meant it.”

“I know, it’s just--” Kaz gave a warm but frustrated sigh. “Doc, you’re way too kind for a battlefield medic.”

“Really? Every kind of doctor has to have a decent bedside manner, I think. It shouldn’t be unusual.”

“Decent? If you were a fine young brunette nurse I’d want to marry you on the spot!” Kaz’s laugh was tinged with a bit of a rough edge, and he quietly took another drink.

“Come on, don’t make fun of an old man like that.”

“Ooh, a cougar, even better!”

“Well, if you can joke like that, you must be feeling better. Ready to get up?”

“N-no, wait. I’m sorry!” Kaz tried to push himself up to a seated position, but Medic firmly put a hand on his shoulder.

“I was kidding. Rest up as long as you like, Kaz.”

Kaz let himself fall back into the pillows with a huff, idly itching at the gauze around the IV on his wrist as Medic got up to return to his paperwork.

If he was getting what he wanted, why did he feel so stupid?


	4. Chapter 4

“It’s not that easy.”

Kaz deflected Medic’s suggestion with a laugh, his coy eyes flashing in the low light of the bar, standing off to the side and sipping a rum and coke as he watched the Medic play pinball. The man's intense concentration on the game had drawn Kaz in again to zone out and watch the winding path of the mirrored ball. Kaz had been moaning about all the additional things Snake had added to his rota, things that he felt like he didn't even receive praise for finishing. He didn't elaborate on how it only seemed to earn him further indignities. His schedule had gotten to the point where he started to envy the latrine cleaners, Kaz went so far as to argue, because, after all, there was a finite number of latrines. He hadn't thought Medic had been listening. It was just a step above talking to a wall, or screaming it into the void, he’d rationalized. But then--

“So just say no. Why not just tell him you can’t at this point?” That was Medic had said. His tone was tinged with the slightest edge of annoyance, even anger, a subtle change that took Kaz aback for a moment. 

“Being behind those flippers makes you ask some bold questions, huh?”

He waited, but the other man didn’t respond to his dismissal, instead narrowing his eyes and biting his lip as he drew the machine into multi-ball. Kaz huffed, rolling his eyes even though now, truly no one was paying attention, drained his drink, and retreated to the bar.

Some kind of bullshit suggestion. He couldn’t. For some reason that hadn’t been the advice Kaz had expected or wanted, despite being the most obvious course of action. It pissed him off. He went to the bar and ordered a tequila shot, then another, part of him hoping to push the rest of the evening down into oblivion. He stewed in his frustration alone, too focused on resenting the failure of his relaxing evening away from the boss to realize that this was tightening his hold, snaking through the cracks in Kaz's guard even when he was miles away. 

Maybe Kaz was about to have an epiphany to that effect, with a small palace of upended shot glasses in front of him, but it ended up being that he was more holding himself up on the bar now than leaning on it, knuckles white and hands cold with sweat. He could feel a bitter taste rising in the back of his throat, and didn't know if he was going to puke, or start leaking pathetic tears from the realization that the bar was mostly empty, and no one had approached him or even asked him if he wanted to go back. He must have looked deranged. Kaz groaned, carefully relaxing one of his hands to reach up and cover his face, waiting for which of the two equally embarrassing possibilities would take over. Instead, he felt a gentle warmth, a firm forearm, reaching around his waist to steady him on his feet.

"Commander, what are we going to do with you?"

Kaz was past coming up with a witty retort and merely leaned his full weight onto the other man, who guided him out of the bar and into the backseat of a jeep, letting him lie across the three seats and feel the breeze from night air, watch the shadows of the swaying trees as he drove. When they arrived at Mother Base, the same warm arm hoisted Kaz up by the shoulder. Kaz was steadier on his feet now, feeling better except for his stomach, which still felt like a roiling pit. He gazed grimly across at the man who had drove him home.

"Vincente."

"Commander."

Kaz winced at the flatness of the medic's response, but accepted his shoulder to lean on. Medic gently turned to drop him off at his shared room with Big Boss but Kaz huffed, and shook his head vigorously, as if hit with another sudden wave of nausea, when he realized where they were going.

“Fuck no, I’m not trying to sneak in there. What is it? 4 am? Crazy motherfucker will kill me.”

“What are you going to do then? Sleep outside?” Medic sighed with exasperation, his own body aching and hardly ready to face another shift in a few hours.

Kaz furrowed his brow for a moment. “Med bay… you have a lot of cots, right?”

“They’re for patients.”

“Come on! I’ll end up in one anyways if I wake him up like this.” Kaz said, on the verge of pleading. Medic only had to consider a second before giving in, not wanting to mentally run through the whole litany of times he'd had to give him stitches, or put ice on a dark bruise, or-- 

He remembered the sound of Kaz gagging, choking, seconds before he had to jam his fingers down his throat. Maybe breaking protocol for a night, in the grand scheme of things, wouldn't be so bad. 

“Fine, but I’m kicking you out first thing.”

When they got to the med bay, he guided Kaz down on one of the cots and turned back to the sink to retrieve a glass of water for the bedside table, then slid Kaz’s precious sunglasses off so he wouldn’t roll on top of them in bed. The commander’s face was pale and damp from the times he’d thrown up on the walk there, and there were deep bags under his eyes, his lips were chapped and thin. Kaz was alternately opening his eyes and scrunching them shut again, trying to get a sense of where he was in the world moving around him. Medic frowned at him, setting the glass to the side and grabbing a tissue to wipe away a string of phlegm and bile twining together on his chin.

“Kaz, I’m serious.”

“I know that, ballbuster,” Kaz responded automatically. “About what?”

“You have to tell him you can’t keep doing this. You're clearly drinking too much, hardly sleeping... Something's wrong. You look like shit.”

Kaz propped himself up on an elbow, his head still spinning.

“S… Same to you, doc. And... It's commander to you, remember?” He hissed through his teeth as another wave of nausea made his stomach coil. 

Medic pulled away, too tired to argue, planning only to go to another cot to collapse for the few hours he had before sun up, but Kaz’s shaky hand managed to catch his arm.

“Wait… I’m cold," Kaz tried, weakly, stupidly.

“It’s 30 degrees out at night, idiot. You'll live.”

“No, wait…” Kaz pulled on his arm firmly. "I'm sorry, I just don't want to be..." he trailed off, clutching the sleeves of Medic's fatigues until he got the message and kicked off his shoes, sliding onto the cot. Kaz’s arm fell on top of him like lead and before long his commander was curled next to him like a kid who’d had a nightmare, head resting on his shoulder.

This was definitely not protocol. And yet-- something about it made Medic's heart pound. Wasn't this what he had wanted, had been waiting out for? A moment when the commander, or, Kaz... would let his ridiculous guard down for a moment, and finally let him... But he couldn't. Kaz was smashed, after all, and it's his job to take care of the staff, even if this was above and beyond the call of duty...

“Don’t say anything,” Kaz went on after a moment, in which it felt like neither of them were breathing. His voice was so soft, but so close to the other man's ear, chin resting on his shoulder. “I don’t want to hear any advice right now.”

“Right.”

"It's my turn to grill you," Kaz said after a small hiccup, with a slight chuckle. Medic relaxed a bit, feeling the playful lilt return to his voice, and decided to simply lie still, enjoying the warmth from the man next to him. "You think you can give me a hard time well..." He stopped abruptly, trying to come up with some chip on the Medic's armor to exploit, but his weary brain ended up landing on the least creative option. "When's the last time you got laid, anyways?"

It was Medic's turn to laugh, before interjecting firmly. 

"Sleep, Miller."

"Oh, medic... you're so uptight, such a hardass... I really wonder though. A decent looking guy like you, you're not married, and there's no rumors, so I can only assume--"

"A while," Medic interrupted, cutting him off.

"What, like, months?" The only response Kaz received was an abrupt, muffled laugh. "Do you even remember?"

"When you're as old as I am it matters a bit less, commander." Kaz squirmed a bit next to him, lined up so he could study his profile more closely. Medic watched him nervously out of the corner of his eye.

"Come on, you're not dead yet! Are you more into the petite type of girls, like Ray, or the athletic types... No, maybe something a bit softer?"

"Kaz..."

"No, you’re always so serious when this kind of thing comes up! You're not wiggling out of it this time."

Medic sighed, returning his gaze to the ceiling. 

"Well, I already said... I don't go to the bar to socialize. Not the one you take us to, anyways. Let’s just say there’s no reason for me to go out of my way to meet local women."

"O-oh." 

He could feel Kaz go still and slightly tense next to him as he gradually made the connection that Medic had been trying to imply all along. Medic closed his eyes and sucked in a long breath, waiting either for Kaz to pull away, or worse, tell him to leave in his own infirmary. Instead, after a moment, he could feel Kaz's breathing relax, and his body sink even deeper into the cot.

"Kaz?"

"I-- Sorry, I just feel kind of stupid."

"Don't worry about it. You'll forget what I said tomorrow anyways. Now sleep, seriously." Medic took a final, brief glance at Kaz, who was staring ahead, past him, at nothing much at all, brow furrowed determinedly. Medic let his eyes fall shut, and wasn't sure if it was the last moment of consciousness or the first moment of a dream when he heard Kaz’s voice, warm, familiar, but a tone he hadn’t heard in a long time.

"No, I'll remember."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...gay
> 
> This is an expansion on a short I wrote for VKaz week! As will be the remaining two chapters, which are on their way.
> 
> get @ me: coleoptera-kinbote.tumblr // @coleo_kin


	5. Chapter 5

Commander Miller pulled up to the medical platform in the jeep typically used for excursions to the nearby town, 15 minutes before Medic’s shift ended. He beeped the horn a few times before catching Vincente’s eye as he checked off the remaining supplies in each cabinet, then playfully waved and gestured to the passenger seat.

“Come on! It’s Friday. You can clock out a little early,” He called.

“Really?” Vincente made a show of trying to resist but was already stowing the clipboard away for the weekend. Everyone else had gone off to their other Friday evening engagements early, if there was some sort of accident the second Medic they’d hired, Speeding Ray, a slim but tough woman in her 30s who had spent an equal amount of time midwifing for her village as she did tending the battle wounds of local revolutionaries, would be on duty.

“Medic, I outrank you. Don’t make me say it again,” Miller responded with mock seriousness. Vincente locked the cabinets and took a final look around before playfully jogging to the jeep. Didn’t want to get in trouble after all.

Initially, Medic didn’t even think to ask where they were going, or why they pulled out of camp with only the two of them in the car. He felt happy and relaxed to be alone with his friend for once, and it had felt like weeks since they had time for anything more than rushed conversations between shifts. Things were picking up at MSF. More men and more complicated missions meant more injured, and Kaz was also left dealing with the complications brought on by the bizarre collection of civilians they were amassing.

He ended up thinking about the last time they had spent an extended period alone, together. After a night at the usual bar MSF guys hit up on the weekends, the group had piled back into the jeeps to head back to base, and Medic seemed to be the only one to notice the commander was missing. He insisted on going back for him, knowing he’d last seen him drinking himself into oblivion, the rest of the men assumed he was probably getting lucky and would find his own way back to the base. Vincente had been right, because of course he was, the wise old man of MSF, even older than the boss, and, hey isn’t that a grey hair… of course he knew Kaz would be slumped over the bar, gagging on his own guts and about to pass out rather than in a hotel room with some babe.

He’d come out to him in a way, after driving his ass home and letting him sleep in ~~share~~ a medbay cot. Come out to him then because he was still feeling the booze a bit and Kaz wouldn’t even remember it anyways. A trial run. Maybe somewhere he had hoped for more than just acceptance or even Kaz not totally flipping out, but he pushed that to the back of his mind. It was a slow, awkward realization and then Kaz had passed out, huddled up against his shoulder just the same.

Whatever. Pointless to think about. He was glad Kaz seemed to be drinking less, as the leads started to seem to be going somewhere, the missions becoming more of a success. He even seemed to put on a big brotherly role with the kids who were staying on the base now, Chico and Paz, trying to control himself for their sake, though he did still get embarrassingly tipsy sometimes. Maybe things with Big Boss were going better? Medic sighed. Whatever _that_ going well meant.

“Where are we headed?” Medic asked eventually, sinking comfortably into the seat as they bumped along the rough dirt roads leading away from the base.

“Surprise. For you. I won’t say anything more.” He looked away from the road briefly to give Medic a cheesy grin that made his stomach flip.

Kaz kept driving on for what felt like almost an hour, then more, and the sun began to sink below the horizon. Just as Medic was about to ask, no, seriously, where are we headed, Kaz pulled to an abrupt halt in the middle of the town they were driving through. Squashed between two larger buildings was a tiny bar that, frankly, looked quite low key for a Friday evening. Quickly finding the nearest place to park Kaz walked around to Medic’s side of the car and opened the door for him.

“Seriously, Kaz? What is this?”

Kaz grinned, and grabbed him by the sleeve, playfully pulling him along towards the bar. It took a few seconds after bursting through the door for Medic to realize the clientele of the bar were… almost entirely men.

“Kaz…”

“It took a lot of research but I found the closest gay bar to MSF!” Kaz waited a few moments for Medic to do anything other than giving him a silent, albeit surprised, look. When he didn’t say anything, Kaz hurriedly blabbed on to fill the silence. “I mean… that conversation we had a few weeks ago. You said you didn’t even remember the last time you–”

“I get it. You’re making it weird.” Vincente felt a pit forming in his stomach. So he did remember, and clearly, what they had talked about, even though he was totally wasted. Great. Kaz could sense his anxious silence.

“What!” He interjected, impatient for Medic to give a more obvious response.

“If this was the plan you could have told me outside!” He huffed under his breath, pulling Kaz close to avoid anyone else hearing. What Medic wanted to say, really, was that springing it on him like some type of gag was like screaming that Kaz had some guy on base who’d fuck him, but _he_ didn’t. Medic took a few more breaths, clenching his teeth, to stop himself from opening that can of worms. “And what do you plan to do, huh? Wingman for me, when you’ve clearly never been in a gay bar in your life?”

“N-no… I was just going to let you be and go to the normal bar down the street…”

Medic realized his hand was clenched in a death grip on Kaz’s shoulder. He slowly released it, and stoically brushed off where he had been digging his fingers into his shirt.

“The normal bar… right.”

“I’m sorry… do you hate it?”

Medic tried to calm himself, to remember how he used to hold himself with the cool deportment of a normal guy who just wanted a drink when he frequented these places, though the last time had been several years ago.

“I get the sentiment…” He muttered at last. “Stupid thing to spring on a guy like this, though.”

“Sorry…” Kaz repeated, taking a quick glance around the room. He went red to his ears, Medic noticed, even with his glasses on. Funny.

“Well, get out of here, unless you want everyone to think I’m taken.”

“Hey, would that be so bad?” Kaz flashed a nervous grin before backing towards the door, not giving Medic a chance for a clever response. “I’m going, I’m going! You know where I’ll be.”

Medic took another long breath and headed straight for the bar, skipping the dancefloor entirely after being on his feet all day. He hoisted himself up onto a stool and ordered a straight whiskey to take the edge off his nerves.

He wasn’t alone for long.

“Don’t feel like dancing?” Medic looked up from his drained glass. A gentleman who seemed to be in his mid-30s joined him, ordering another drink for both of them.

“No, I didn’t plan to come here anyways.”

“Oh?”

“A friend was so scandalized when I told him how long it’d been since I got laid, he drove me here.” The other man took a sip of his drink and laughed sympathetically. “Besides, I’m too old to stay up dancing all night.”

“You and me both.” The other man was happy that someone else around his age had shown up, Medic could sense that immediately. Most of the men were like he had been at one point in time, sneaking away from college on the weekends, or just off their generic day jobs. Young, still flush with the eagerness and excitement of having found a place where they could openly show a hidden side of themselves.

But then life happens. Med school, commitments stacking up, even falling in love a few times. And then hanging out at the same bar every weekend stops feeling like a perfect fit, and more like a sign your life isn’t going anywhere.

But this man was funny, kind. He asked interesting questions about Vincente’s position as a Battlefield Medic, caught on to his Uruguayan accent almost instantly. Medic asked him about himself. He drove produce delivery trucks. He liked fantasy novels. His special talent was swimming underwater for long distances. He was a good guy.

Eventually he asked Vincente if he’d like to go out behind the bar for a smoke. Medic responded that he didn’t smoke, thanks, but he’d love to get some fresh air. It was a lovely, clear summer night. Vincente had been on the fence about whether he’d actually try to do anything, but with the fresh air and a few drinks under his belt he felt a surge of nerve.

He reached over to grab the other man’s hand as he pulled the pack of cigarettes from his pocket.

“You know, being a medical doctor, it’s my responsibility to warn you against those things.”

The other man raised his eyebrows, amused, playing along. Good, Medic thought to himself. He wasn’t so rusty after all.

“Really, doc? Guess we don’t have anything else to do out here then…”

Concealed by the shadows from the surrounding buildings, Medic pressed the other man against the wooden slats of the bar, kissing him tentatively, with a warm hand cupped around his jaw, before he opened his mouth with a pleased sigh, allowing him to go deeper. It quickly escalated to hands running up under shirts, hips pressing together. Medic paused to catch his breath, wrapping an arm around the other man’s shoulder and breathing in the scent of the crook of his neck.

Feeling each other up out behind the bar, huh. Back in college it would have been an adventure but now he could feel his mind wandering. He’d probably never see this man again, they hadn’t even told each other their names. It was irresponsible too, what if something happened on base with him two hours away? Ray was still learning the ropes, where everything was in the cupboards… What if Kaz was getting drunk again? Someone had to drive them back. Why did he even drag him out here in the first place, that idiot…

He realized suddenly that he’d gone entirely inside his own head, had stopped even the absurd, mechanical motions of kissing the other man, and was still. The other man tried to press a few more kisses to the straight line of his mouth before pulling away.

“You alright?”

“Yeah, sorry. I’m just… overthinking. I don’t think I can…”

“It’s fine.”

“I’m sorry, you’re great. I just have so much on my mind… You deserve better.”

“Come on, don’t talk like that.” The other man smiled. Sincere, honest. God, he really did deserve someone better, someone who knew what the fuck they were doing. He pulled the pack of cigarettes from his pocket again, lighting his own and then offering it to Medic. “Want a smoke, doc?”

Medic smiled, trying not to look too sad. “Sorry, I should go.”

Leaving the bar, Medic turned down the street and stuck his face in the window of the first bar he came across, only a few paces away. Kaz was seated at the counter there, of course, chatting with a voluptuous older woman but still looking fairly put together. Medic entered the bar and gave him a quick wave, and Kaz politely excused himself before rushing over, trying, ineffectively, to mask his excitement.

“Back already? You work quick, huh.” Kaz said, sounding almost excessively pleased as they left the bar and climbed back into the jeep. He gave Medic a once-over, and Medic realized he must look a mess with how quickly he dashed out of the bar, his clothes still rumpled and his face still flushed.

“Kaz, we should–”

“Ah, ah, ah! I’m not putting the keys in until you tell me.”

“What.”

“Did you get some? You look like you got some.”

V rolled his eyes and sighed.

“…Yeah. Of course.”

A strange expression clouded Kaz’s face for a second, but he quickly jammed the keys into the ignition and started the jeep up.

“Well, how was it?” he ventured, once they had pulled out of town and onto the open roads.

“I’m not like you, commander. I don’t kiss and tell… and tell and tell.” Medic said it with a laugh, but Kaz scrunched his brow, genuinely annoyed.

“Fine… whatever.”

“He was a nice man, and I’ll probably never see him again. That enough for you?”

“Well, isn’t that the point?”

“Maybe for someone your age.” Kaz took his eyes off the road for a moment to shoot a peeved glance at Medic. “How about you, any luck with the ladies?”

“No!” Kaz denied the question as if he’d been asked something ridiculous. “I couldn’t, you know, vanish if you needed to find me. I was waiting for you! And anyways, Boss says I should try to have more… self-control. With that.”

“Mm… That.”

Medic slouched in his seat, leaning against the door and letting his arm hang out the window, watching Kaz as he stared down the road. Something was really eating at him now, Medic could tell. Somewhere between picturing him picking up a guy in a bar and more of his boss’ warnings about self-control, Kaz’s face had lost its vibrancy and flush that it got when he could show off his gift of gab in bar patter. As cocky as he could get, Vincente still preferred to see him that way, without his front of confidence shaken or chipped away.

“Hey, I had a really good time.”

Kaz turned from the road for a second again, if only to be sure Medic saw the extent of his eyeroll.

“Yeah, you told me. Go scream it from the rooftops, pal.”

“I didn’t mean it that way, come on.”

“Oh, then what did you mean, Mr. I-Just-Got-Laid?”

Medic sighed, taken aback by how irritated Kaz seemed, still.

“I meant… This is nice. That you’d do something for me, just driving around with you, talking. That kind of stuff. So thanks.” There was a long silence between them, Medic comfortably gazing at Kaz’s profile as the warm night, full of the sound of frogs and ruslting plants whizzed by around them. Eventually, Kaz’s face softened into a slight smile.

“Better than getting your dick sucked?”

Medic smirked, turning to gaze out the window himself.

“Listen Commander, I’m not going to rise to that bait. I feel like there’s a distinct possibility you’re just trying to gather intel on what transpired…”

“Oh shut up!” Kaz laughed. “Seriously… the thanks I get for trying to be nice."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, this is another scene I drafted during VKaz week, but edited and expanded! One more chapter to go!
> 
> https://vimeo.com/183423858
> 
> I'm @coleo_kin ayyy


	6. Chapter 6

Down the beach, far away from the ever-growing Mother Base, which was just an outline on the horizon, the Milky Way was draped over them like a sparkling blanket, blooming in full, far from any artificial light. It had been a rowdy party for a few hours, but most of the men had either passed out, dozing on the warm sand, or dragged themselves back to the base. Only two couldn’t still their minds enough to sleep as the once bright bonfire died down to glowing embers.

It was uncharacteristic for Medic to be one of the last ones out. He was the member of staff who needed the most sleep, and looked like it most days. Commander Miller could increasingly take or leave the late nights himself, now. He was busy, even moreso lately, with all the changes coming to MSF, but he also took his social life seriously. He had a reputation to maintain, after all, even if it was becoming increasingly obvious that the past two years had hardened him, physically and mentally, from the dopey playboy image he had fostered in the early days.

Medic gazed across the receeding flames at Kaz’s unreadable profile, wondering why he seemed to be only punishing himself, staying out this late after the rest of the men had fallen unconscious, either around the bonfire or back in their own beds. Still, anyone could ask the same about himself. Medic’s own intent had been to get the commander alone, to try and work up the guts to talk to him candidly about things that had been on his mind over the past weeks, and now that the nearest soldier was on his side and softly snoring, the chance was there. He’d assumed he would soon get a private moment walking back to base with Kaz, but, even though he seemed atypically disconnected from the revelry, the commander was still seated, cradling a flask of rum between his knees, as the gold Rolex on his wrist inched towards 3AM. A new feature. He tried not to think too much about what it meant.

Any minute now, Medic thought to himself, I’ll do it. A long, but companionable silence had fallen between them. Medic was desperately tired, but he knew that if he went back to his bunk now, he’d likely be staring at the ceiling for the next four hours. Despite all the other things he had bore with a hesitant smile over the past two years, something had begun to make him feel like he had to do something, and soon, get all the cards out on the table before he might never have a chance to. Why did he suddenly feel that way? It seemed like a bad sign, but at the same time he couldn’t afford to overthink it. He was just drawing out the nerves acting like this, so come on, just get it out–

He was halfway through opening his mouth to speak when Kaz turned to him, his face absolutely unreadable, because, of course, he still had his damn sunglasses on in the pitch dark, only interrupted by a few remaining glowing logs.

“Do you have a talent?” He asked absentmindedly, slurring a bit. All the thoughts racing through Medic’s head instantly derailed.

“A… what?”

“For the talent show on Peace Day… I’m going to play guitar, Paz will sing…” Medic watched attentively as Kaz pulled off his sunglasses, rubbing them carefully on his shirt, examining them, sighing. The glasses had been hiding deep dark circles below his eyes. “You wanna join in?” Kaz looked towards Medic, carefully tucking the arm of his sunglasses in the breast pocket of his fatigues.

Medic shifted, staring out over the waves. “I’d just be redundant, only thing I can do is play the guitar myself.”

“That’s not true, we can always make up a harmony for you to play.” Medic could hear a gentle smile in the other man’s voice which brought out one of his own. When he turned back to look at Kaz, he had moved closer, placing a warm but slightly clammy hand on his knee. “We’ll be the stars of Peace Day. It’ll be a blast, or well–” He removed his hand, sighing and fiddling with his glasses again. The window had closed. “Something to look forward to, anyways.”

Close, in the dim glow of the dying fire and with nothing in between them, Medic had a chance to try and read his commander’s eyes unhindered for once, before he slid his sunglasses back on. While he was smiling, his whole expression, exhausted and absent, made it clear that he wasn’t sure if such a thing would even happen in the first place, if a Peace Day was anything more than a fantasy in the increasingly complex conflict that surrounded them. Medic tried to puff up his own response with confidence that wasn’t there.

“Yeah, sounds great.” He waited a beat, expecting Kaz to get up, take another drink, anything, but he was still sitting there, messing with the pocket he had slid his glasses into. Medic took a deep breath before going on. “Kaz, are you—“

Before he could finish his thought, Kaz lurched forward, groaning, and Vincente quickly glanced away, waiting for the telltale sound of heaving, vomit dropping to the ground, but it never came. Instead it seemed like some undignified sniffing, sucking in humid air through clenched teeth, were the only sounds besides the nearby waves.

Was he crying? It seemed like such a cruel question to ask.

Just as suddenly as he had doubled over in pain, Kaz was shakily righting himself, kicking sand onto the fire that sent up a thin stream of smoke as he shifted anxiously between his legs.

“I have to go back,” he said, like it was a thought that had only just occurred to him.

“Hey, let me walk with you,” Medic offered, standing up and smoothly grabbing the mostly-empty flask from Kaz’s hands, sliding it into his own back pocket. Kaz shot the other man a sour look, to make sure he noticed what he’d done, one he hoped said “you don’t need to babysit me,” but it was hardly convincing when he was so unsteady on his feet.

The second time Kaz stopped to lean against a tree, it was obvious what was coming. Medic kept a stiff arm against his back as he gagged, splattering the stink of cheap beer and bile all over his boots, careful not to come off as too tender. When he was done, Medic pushed him back to lean against the tree, dumping the remainder of the alcohol in the flask over his shoes to splash the flecks of puke off. He chucked the flask in the dirt, and then roughly pressed Kaz’s shoulder’s back, getting as good a look at his unguarded face as he could in the low light. Like a scolded dog, Kaz refused to make any sort of eye contact.

Vincente grumbled, tugging off Kaz’s own sunny yellow scarf to wipe away a rope of phlegm and spit still clinging to his chin. Kaz made no move of resistance. Other wet tracks were running across and down his face, but Medic ignored them. He pulled his canteen from a side pocket and held it to Kaz’s mouth, tipping in a bit of water until Kaz closed his mouth, turned his head away. He swished the water in his mouth a few seconds before spitting it out, scowling.

“Drink it, don’t just spit it out.”

“I hate it when you do this, you know.”

Medic couldn’t help but let a bitter chuckle escape at that. “Well I don’t like it much either, but what good of a medic would I be if I let the second in command pass out in the middle of the jungle, waiting to be eaten by mosquitos and begging for the hangover of a lifetime?”

Again, Kaz wouldn’t look him in the eye. Vincente forced the dirty scarf he was holding into one of Kaz’s hands, and Kaz stuffed it into his back pocket.

“Why do you keep doing this?” Medic went on, pushing the canteen into Kaz’s hands this time, who took it and drank. “You’re obviously well past the point of having fun, and you don’t lose yourself either, so it feels like it must be… you feel like you have to punish yourself for something, but you don’t know how.”

“I… I did something really fucked up,” Kaz said softly, after taking a long sip from the canteen. It was as if he was murmuring the words in his sleep. “He’s going to kill me, he’s really going to kill me this time.”

Medic sighed, thinking back to the last time Kaz was probably referring to, the now-legendary brawl about Kaz’s… _liberated tendencies_ which had nearly destroyed the saunas and showers in one fell swoop. Kaz had a busted lip, a chipped tooth, and had needed stitches in his forehead after that one, and it had only provoked more tawdry rumours about his off-time relationship with the boss. Men being men was one thing, but it felt so wrong, like his heart was sinking through a hole in his gut as he’d patched up Kaz on his table, all puffed up with false confidence, as if the injuries were some sort of hard won battle scars.

He didn’t know what he could say then. And when it was happening again, he didn’t know what to say. It wasn’t until Kaz gently pressed the canteen against his chest that Medic realized he’d been staring blankly over Kaz’s shoulder. The other man was looking right at him now.

_God, you’re so impossible, but I still want—_

He pushed Kaz’s extended arm aside, the little water left in the canteen pouring to the ground as he leaned forward to embrace Kaz. It started out as a gesture that could be read as merely friendly, but Kaz gradually let more and more of his weight ease against Medic, Medic’s hands wandered gently from his shoulders to explore the small of his back, his hips. Kaz’s shallow breathing calmed and became relaxed, warm and enticing. Vincente leaned in, brushing his cheek and neck with the corner of his lips, and Kaz’s own parted to let out a gentle sigh that shot through him so hard he had to grit his teeth. Commander Miller clearly wasn’t oblivious, or playing dumb anymore. Vincente wanted so badly to cross that line, or at least meet him at it, the line between intimation, wishful thinking, and what they’d both been dancing around for what felt like an impossibly long time.

This was stupid. This was the exact opposite of what he should be doing. The sensible one, the restrained one. The babysitter.

He grasped Kaz’s hip tighter and lifted his other hand to run through his hair, which had begun to fall out of its usual style into a charmingly mussed heap. Their faces, lips, were only centimetres away now, and Vincente even felt Kaz’s warm breath over his before a hand tightened on his arm.

“Wh- wait. What are you doing?”

“What?” It took Medic a moment to process that Kaz was really doing this, after all the telling moments they’d shared, putting up a false front of coyness. “What the fuck do you think--!”

“Vincente, I don’t—“

“No, enough.” Vincente pulled away, simultaneously taking a step back and pushing Kaz, who hadn’t even fully regained his footing, back against the tree. “You don’t see what this is? You think I wait around to talk you down from every stupid decision you make because it’s my hobby? You’ve got a guy who will whale on you like a punching bag for stepping out of line but you still throw it away for anyone—“ he stops, digging his fingernails into his palm, (forcing himself to stop short of “— _but me_ ”) “Why? Because you want the attention? Well here’s your fucking attention! It’s driving me up the fucking wall, I feel like I can’t do anything for you!”

“Is that… what you think this is about?” Kaz croaked, like there was a lump in his throat, but still managed to sound defiant, smug, even as he slid his back down the tree, losing his footing from exhaustion. “Throwing it away…” He laughed. But when he spoke again it was deadly serious. Moreso than Vincente had ever heard before, even when he was giving a thorough dressing down to the most insubordinate soldiers.

“Medic.” The title was cold, stripped of any playful affection it may have had before. “I’m your subcommander. You know what that means? Your job is to trust my judgement.” He stopped, raising his eyebrows slightly. He was waiting for something.

“Yes… sir.”

“This time I’ll just warn you, but…” He had come to a full rest on the floor now, only the trunk of the tree keeping him upright. As he was about to go on, he coughed, accidentally sucking in a rope of his own spit. Wet, gagging, retching noises. Pathetic. Medic stood, waiting for him to finish. “But I’d also advise you to go to bed and get some sleep, immediately, so you can do your _fucking job_.”

“Is that all?”

Kaz coughed a few more times and spat. “Yeah, that’s all.”

Vincente turned and left without helping him to his feet.

 

Despite the orders, he couldn’t fall asleep when he crawled, exhausted, into his bunk.

_Is that what you think this is about?_

If not that, then what?

The only thought that allowed Vincente to eventually drift off to sleep was that Kaz had forgiven worse. Maybe they were both too hurt right now to hash things out but with time… well, Kaz couldn’t put on that serious face with him forever. If he knew Kaz, he knew that wasn’t who he really was. Maybe in a few days he’d offer to sit with him, play some guitar like he said. It would take time, when everything stung less, and then maybe they could talk. And Vincente was nothing if not patient. Wouldn’t there always be time?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If not that, then what? (spoilers for PW, but I probably don't need to tell you that.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMa5TgX624Q
> 
> In terms of timeline, I wanted this series to go from shortly after Kaz's arrival at MSF to just before the drama with Paz taking over the metal gear and the resulting incident in Ground Zeroes. I think that's really Kaz's first character arc, where we see him go from fratboy optimism (despite basically being kidnapped and blackmailed into being a paramilitary unit leader's best friend) (what me worry?) to something else, someone who assumed they had it all figured out and quickly found out there's a lot more to... basically everything. Of course this swings to the opposite extreme by the time we see him in TPP, where instead he's paranoid and suspicious of everything. But, by the end, if you can consider the impossible nuclear disarmament cutscene and depending on how you interpret his decision to stay with V and Solid Snake, I think he's learned to put some feelers out in the world and hope again. I don't think the Solid Snake we know and love could have been trained by a completely bitter and paranoid old man, so that's why I'm actually optimistic for Kaz after TPP. 
> 
> Anyways, oops, I meta'd. Thanks again to Kawaiibooker for her advice and letting me write her interpretation of Medic... he's really a delight. <3


End file.
